allhourschurch

Sharing Facilities

What happened to us? Have we lost our first love? Are we working with each other or are we competing against each other? Are we not commanded to lift up one another's burdens? Is it not true that when it was first born, each member of the church layed all of their possessions at the feet of the apostles? Was the Lord pleased if we held anything back? Clearly it was the Lord's will that we share. What happened? Clearly it was the Lord's will that we work together, not one saying "I am of Cephas" and another "I am of Paul" and another "I am of Christ." Why are we not behaving as a family, healed of our former ways, and living in mutual service? Is the body of Christ divided?

It is time to consider our ways and to think beyond whether we should offer a single facility for all of the churches to share - this should be obvious. Instead, we should be setting our minds on what facilities will best serve the people of this city with power and light. We should be thinking about which locations would best serve this city, what purposes will be served in each room and how to be most effective. We should be praying together about this to ask the Lord what to do.

A shared facility makes sense in every way. Think of the various functions - prayer rooms, computers and a library for study and quiet, a counseling area, space for fellowship, space for worship, space for services, space for lectures - teaching, AA meetings, presentations, choir practice, space for musicians, recording studios. Meeting space costs money. If any one church is able to produce such a facility but does not share that facility, the facility goes largely unused. If an individual church possesses such facilities they have typically done so at very great cost - usually sacrificing missions, outreach, help for the poor, by diverting large portions of budgets to these facilities.

A shared facility can turn the whole picture around. Did you know that the #1 pet peave among critics of the church is the way the churches spend their money? This is especially so because the world doesn't think its fair that the churches own so much real estate but are exempt from paying taxes. We value our teaching and the work of God in our ever-expanding church buildings. We see it with our own eyes, but the world sees through a different set of eyes. It doesn't know how to value a salvation it doesn't know it needs. It sees no tangible benefit coming from large buildings. It can quote statistics that make the churches look very dark. Where is the salt? Where is the light? It doesn't show in their midst when the churches fail to reach them, when except for four or five meetings a week, they only find closed doors, when the poor are ignored except for a food pantry once a week for a bag or two of hand-me-down help and when the sick aren't healed because the church does nothing to supplement insurance policies even for its own.

By offering shared facilities that never close, four hundred churches in Tallahassee have access and cost is reduced dramatically. There is never a time when fellowship and counseling are unavailable. There is never a time when a poor student has no access to the Internet or any book, royalty free or not. There is never a time when musicians can't practice for lack of space. There is never a time when a Bible Study can't take place, never a time when a meeting can't be held, never a time there can't be a wedding, a funeral, a baptism, a preaching, a healing, or powerful time of worship. The question is not whether such a facility should exist, but exactly how to design it, how much space is required, where it should be located and how many such facilities are needed.